Visual Factors In Reading

This collection of essays examines how our visual and language systems interact in relationship to reading.



Addresses four important questions concerning the role of vision in reading

Presents recent findings from neuroimaging literature along with important recent work concerning how letters and letter strings are processed

Investigates what constraints the visual system and eye movement control set on visual word recognition

Discusses the role of the left and right visual field, together with the right and left hemispheres in visual word recognition

Evaluates what information the brain computes when we read a word questions the contribution of the visual system on reading disability

Piers L. Cornelissen is a Reader in Psychology at the University of York, UK. As an undergraduate he studied medicine at Worcester College, Oxford, UK, continuing his clinical training at St Thomas's Hospital in London. He studied for a D.Phil. with Professor John Stein at the University Laboratory of Physiology, Oxford, funded by the Wellcome Trust. After three years as a McDonnell-Pew postdoctoral Fellow, he moved to Newcastle upon Tyne to take up a lectureship, and most recently to the University of York as a Reader. The main thrust of his research is to understand the neural basis of reading using a combination of psychophysical and neuroimaging techniques (MEG and fMRI).

Chris Singleton is a Chartered Psychologist and Senior Lecturer in Educational Psychology at the University of Hull. His main research and professional interests are in the development of literacy and the identification and education of children and adults with dyslexia and other learning problems. He is internationally known for pioneering research that resulted in the development of computer-based systems for screening and assessment of dyslexia, visual stress and other cognitive difficulties, now widely used in schools, colleges and universities in the UK and elsewhere in the world. Dr Singleton is an editor of the Journal of Research in Reading and was chair of the National Working Party on Dyslexia in Higher Education.

Editorial.
Piers Cornelissen.
1. Visual constraints in written word recognition: evidence from the optimal viewing-position effect.
Marc Brysbaert and Tatjana Nazir.
2. Pre-schoolers, print and storybooks: an observational study using eye movement analysis.
Laura M. Justice, Lori Skibbe, Andrea Canning and Chris Lankford.
3.Hemispheric division of labour in reading.
Richard C. Shillcock and Scott A. McDonald.
4. Dissociations between serial position and number of letters effects in lateralised visual word recognition.
Michal Lavidor and Peter J. Bailey.
5. Letter-position encoding and dyslexia.
Carol Whitney and Piers Cornelissen.
6. The word shape hypothesis re-examined: evidence for an external feature advantage in visual word recognition.
John R. Beech and Kate A. Mayall.
7. Integration of the visual and auditory networks in dyslexia: a theoretical perspective.
Kristen Pammer and Trichur R. Vidyasagar.
8. The effect of print size on reading speed in dyslexia.
Beth A. O'Brien, J. Stephen Mansfield and Gordon E. Legge.
9. The relationship between dyslexia and Meares-Irlen Syndrome.
Isla Kriss and Bruce J.W. Evans.
10. Visual stress in adults with and without dyslexia.
Chris Singleton and Susannah Trotter.
Notes on Contributors.
Index